


i don’t want to dance

by autoheart



Series: i don’t wanna dance [2]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Getting Together, M/M, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-27
Updated: 2018-10-27
Packaged: 2019-08-08 07:28:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16425026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/autoheart/pseuds/autoheart
Summary: “I don’t wanna dance, I don’t know how. I don’t wanna dance, I don’t know how to dance with you.”Sequel to merlin, you’re a star. Could probably be read alone, but better if you read the other first.Merlin is tired of lessons in sports. So of course he suggests dancing, because he revels in Arthur’s pain.





	i don’t want to dance

“We’re  _ not  _ doing this, Arthur,” Merlin said, holding a knife rather awkwardly in his hand.

They were in his chambers, facing a piece of wood he had fashioned into a target and mounted on the wall. 

“It will be fun,” Arthur promised.

“For you, maybe,” Merlin said, rolling his eyes. “Why can’t we do something, I don’t know, that doesn’t involve a deadly weapon?”

“Oh, like what?” Arthur asked. 

“I don’t know, chess? Take up painting?  Whittling means you get to mess about with a knife, we could do that.” 

“Firstly, we aren’t old men, so we most definitely won't be doing any of that. Secondly, you’ll take off a finger in a second flat if we took up whittling,” Arthur said. 

“Oh, but I won’t maim myself tossing knives about your chamber?” 

“You’ve proven yourself good at sports that involve a target, Merlin,” Arthur said. 

“You know, I said I was your friend so you would stop trying to make me a sportsman,” Merlin sighed. 

“I’m glad to know you really meant it, then.”

“Well obviously, I did, but I thought it meant we could just-“ Merlin trailed off.

“What?”

“I don’t know, hang out without the pretense of teaching me something I have no hope of getting the hang of,” Merlin explained.

Arthur knew he was right. They didn’t have to do this. But teaching him something like this gave him the excuse to touch Merlin, to correct his stance, to fix his aim. He had stopped trying to convince himself it wasn’t that. It was.

“So what do you suggest?”

“Well, if you  _ insist _ on teaching me some skill you have acquired through your princely prowess,” Merlin begin, his eyes not meeting Arthur’s, “you could teach me how to dance.”

“Dance?”

“Yes, you seem to have fun doing it at banquets,” Merlin replied.

“You don’t know how?”

“When would I have had to learn to dance, Arthur? After all, I am just a lowly servant,” he replied, a playful glint in his eye. Arthur couldn’t decide if he liked that look. 

“I don’t know how.” 

“Arthur, I’ve seen you dance, you know how.”

“Well, I don’t know how to dance with  _ you. _ We’re both…”

“What, men? I’ll be the girl, don’t worry. I won’t make you stoop so low as to give up the lead,” Merlin laughed, setting the knife down on the table. “Come on, Arthur, it will be fun.”

 

Arthur swallowed. Dancing meant touching. Not the quick touches that came along with correcting stance, touches that could last too long but not be equated to anything else. Dancing meant being close, face to face, where Merlin could see the heat rise to his cheeks. Dancing meant holding hands and waists for minutes, maybe hours, on end. Dancing meant feeling breath against your cheek. Dancing was entirely too close. 

 

“Merlin…”

“What, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how?”

 

Arthur licked his lips. 

“Fine. Dancing it is.”

 

Merlin beamed at him. 

 

“Alright, what do I do?” Merlin asked. 

“Well,” Arthur said. “You stand in front of me.”

“Obviously,” Merlin said, taking his place.

“And I put a hand here,” he said, putting his left hand on Merlin’s waist, his arm keeping Merlin at what he deemed the safest distance. 

“And I put mine here, yeah?” Merlin asked, resting his hand on Arthur’s shoulder. 

“Yes,” Arthur said, ignoring the way his shoulder tingled with the weight of it. “And I take your hand with this one,” he said, taking the hand that Merlin offered.

They stood, unmoving for a moment, Arthur’s eyes locked on their clasped hands. He felt paralyzed. 

“And?” Merlin asked, breaking the spell.

“And then we go in a circle, you step backward when I step forward. Then to the side, and then you step forward when I step back.”

They began, Merlin stepping back as Arthur pushed forward, his eyes glued on Arthur’s feet. They stepped to the side, then Arthur began the backwards step, only to have his toes immediately crushed by Merlin’s foot.

“Merlin!” 

“Sorry, I’m  _ learning,  _ Arthur,” he said with a smile that seemed to say he did it on purpose. “Let’s try again.”

They did it again this time, with minimal toe maiming.

“See,” Merlin said, “I’m improving.” 

“Barely,” Arthur replied, wondering whether it was his hand that was sweating or Merlin’s. 

“Again,” Merlin said, somehow taking the lead despite their positions in the dance. 

They did it again, Merlin’s eyes still focused on their feet, which he was grateful for. 

“Faster this time,” Arthur said.

“Your arm is a bit rigid, Arthur,” Merlin noted. “Wouldn’t it be easier if we were-“ he cut himself off by pushing himself closer to Arthur, breaking the rigidity of his arm. “This is how you normally do it.. with girls.”

“I didn’t know you were such an ardent study of how I danced, Merlin,” Arthur said, trying to keep his breathing even. 

“I watch a little,” Merlin returned, with that same devilish smile he wore when he knew he had bested Arthur. Bested him in what, this time?

 

He had never understood the appeal of dancing, really. It was a way to pass the time, he supposed. More often it seemed a way for the maids his father invited to court to trap him in conversation. But this was intoxicating. The proximity made his head swim, he felt a bit weak in the knees, and he was sure his hand never felt this warm when held his partner’s. He swore he never felt such heat radiating off a girl’s back when he danced with them. He never felt so much like he was melting into his partner’s body, slowly but surely, when he danced with someone else. This was bad. 

“Faster, you said?” Merlin asked, pulling him back into the dance.

“I’m meant to be leading you,  _ Mer _ lin.”

“Yes, but you are rather distracted, it seems,” Merlin replied, readjusting the hand on Arthur’s shoulder to fit their newfound closeness. It was dangerously near the back of Arthur’s neck. 

They completed a box, faster this time, successfully. 

“There, now we have the hang of it,” Merlin said, triumphant.

“Let’s try to do it without you looking at your feet,” Arthur said. “Bet you won’t be able to.”

“Hey, it’s your toes on the line, not mine.”

Arthur immediately regretted his suggestion. Taking Merlin’s focus away from his feet meant that he was looking at him. It meant they were moving about his room, silent, staring into each other’s eyes. Merlin didn’t step on his feet. He almost wished he had, for an excuse to look away. They turned, moving into another step without pausing. 

Arthur had heard that, when people dance, they get to where there was nothing they could see but their partner. It had never happened to him. Until now. Not that there was much else to look at in his empty chamber but Merlin, but he felt he couldn’t look away if he tried.

His breath hitched as Merlin moved his hand ever so slowly, to rest at the nape of his neck, his thumb playing at his hairline. Merlin smiled, and Arthur realized he had involuntarily tightened his own grip on Merlin’s waist, his hand now resting at the small of the other boy’s back. 

But they didn’t stop. They kept turning around Arthur’s chamber, the only sound the soft, rhythmic patter of their feet and their own measured breathing. And Arthur’s heartbeat, ringing in his ears so loudly that he was sure it could be heard as far away as Ealdor. 

_ Why in the world,  _ Arthur thought,  _ did I agree to this?  _

“This is nice,” Merlin said, his voice nearly a whisper.

“People wouldn’t do it if it wasn’t,” he replied.

“I mean, it’s nice to dance with  _ you _ , Arthur.” 

Arthur searched Merlin’s face, realizing, suddenly, that Merlin’s thought process may not have been so far from his own. That perhaps, Merlin has chosen a dance lesson because it meant touching, because it meant being close. That maybe the pinkness in the other boy’s cheeks wasn’t a trick of the light. That if he leant in to kiss Merlin, he wouldn’t back away.

It was the first time he had let himself think that word in relation to Merlin, at least concretely. Kiss. He had never let himself put the words kiss and Merlin next to each other in a sentence. Of course, he had thought of kissing him before, but always thought of him as just that pronoun- him.  _ What would he do if I kissed Him?  _ Or  _ What would kissing Him feel like?  _ But he never specified Merlin. Despite the fact there was no one else  _ He  _ could be. 

_ You’re already in this deep,  _ a voice in the back of his head reasoned.

He leant forward, closing the small space that still existed between them, bringing his lips to meet Merlin’s only for a second, their steps halting.

He tried to pull away, to look at Merlin, to gauge his reaction, but the hand at the nape of his neck found its way to the back of his head and held him in place. 

Merlin pressed his mouth hard against Arthur’s. Arthur drew in a breath of surprise through his nose but didn’t try to pull back again. Merlin dropped Arthur’s hand and brought his own to the side of Arthur’s neck. Arthur took his newly freed hand and ran it through Merlin’s hair, as he had imagined doing innumerable times. 

Merlin finally pulled away to catch his breath, but Arthur found he had forgotten how to breathe. 

“That was nicer,” Merlin said, finally, finding Arthur’s eyes with his own. “Though you failed to mention that step. It seems to be one you’ve omitted from other dances have seen you do.”

“I’ve never wanted to include it,” Arthur said, carefully. “With other dances.”

“So, I’m special,” Merlin replied, taking his hand from Arthur’s neck to brush the hair from his forehead. Like he had so many times when Arthur was ill and he was trying to gauge his temperature. Or so he said. Arthur realized now it may have been another excuse to touch. oh 

“Don’t let it go to your head,” Arthur said. 

“But you don’t deny it?” 

“ _ Mer _ lin,” Arthur said.

“What? You started it,” he pointed out. “You know, by-“ he cut himself off by kissing Arthur again quickly. “By doing that.” 

“What are we doing?” Arthur breathed.

“Kissing.” Merlin said. “For now.” 

“Right,” Arthur laughed. “For now.” 

 

*** 

“They’ve been in his chambers for ages,” Gwen said, bursting into Morgana’s chambers with a basket of her newly laundered gowns.

“Have they?” Morgana asked from her seat at the vanity. 

“Yes, and I walked by and it was terribly quiet in there,” she added, with a conspiratorial look. “Much too quiet to be throwing knives.”

“Good,” Morgana said. 

“Good?”

“It means they’ve either killed each other or they’ve figured it out,” Morgana elaborated. 

“You think?” Gwen asked, opening Morgana’s wardrobe. 

“Either way, at least we don’t have to watch them tip toe around it anymore. It’s been torture,” Morgana said, smiling.

“But if they haven’t killed each other, we have to watch them flirt  _ on purpose,”  _ Gwen laughed.

“You know what? I hope they’re dead,” Morgana groaned. 

**Author's Note:**

> Listen, the dancing is not period accurate but it’s cuter this way.


End file.
